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Nobuhiro Watsuki
Nobuhiro Watsuki (和月 伸宏, Watsuki Nobuhiro), a manga-ka and video game character designer, is the creator of Rurouni Kenshin. Manga Works *''Teacher Pon'' was written by Watsuki during high school, and earned the Tezuka award. *''Hokuriku Yūrei Kobanashi'' earned the Hop Step award. *''Crescent Moon in the Warring States'' was Watsuki's first professional work. Set in the Sengoku Jidai era of the warring states, it relates the tale of a former lone Hiten-Mitsurugi swordsman Hiko Seijūrō. It is collected in the sixth Rurouni Kenshin tankōbon volume. *''Rurouni: Meiji Swordsman Romantic Story'' is the name of two one-shots that preceded Rurouni Kenshin's launch in Weekly Shōnen Jump. They are collected in the first and third Rurouni Kenshi n tankōbon volumes, respectively. *''Rurouni Kenshin'' (るろうに剣心) is Watsuki's best known work. It chronicles the adventures of an ex-hitokiri in the Meiji Era. It ran for 255 chapters which were compiled into 28 tankōbon, 22 kanzenban and in North America only, 9 wide-ban. *''Kenshin Kaden'' is a guidebook that includes the full color short story, "Haru ni Sakura", which details the fates of all of the Rurouni Kenshin characters after the conclusion of the story. "Haru ni Sakura" was included in the ninth volume of North America's wide-ban edition of Rurouni Kenshin. *''Yahiko no Sakabatō'' (弥彦の逆刃刀, "Yahiko's Reversed-Edge Sword") is also set in the Rurouni Kenshin universe, five years after the conclusion of the main story. Myōjin Yahiko must save the daughter of a dojo master from an old foe. It was included in the twenty second Rurouni Kenshin kanzenban volume, in the twenty eighth volume of the European release of Rurouni Kenshin and in the ninth volume of North American's wide-ban edition of Rurouni Kenshin. *''Meteor Strike'' (メテオ ストライク''Meteo Sutoraiku'') is a one-shot written for a Shōnen Jump artist competition. It chronicles the what-if adventures of a young boy who is struck in the head by a meteor and gains superhuman powers, eventually saving his town from a nuclear disaster. It is enclosed in the twenty-eighth volume of Rurouni Kenshin. **Watsuki created Meteor Strike while in the middle of writing Rurouni Kenshin. Watsuki felt disgusted with the work and originally did not plan on revealing it, but he ultimately decided to include Meteor Strike to increase the page count of the volume. Watsuki said that after reading the story over it "relaxed" him "in a nice way." Watsuki said that the work has "some different flavors" than Rurouni Kenshin. **Watsuki included three main elements in the story. He had wanted to use meteors in a story since they are the "most energetic natural phenomena." His second element was a boy wearing a pair of white gloves. Watsuki described white gloves as "sort of plain" and "not cool at all," yet he considers the element to be one of his favorites since the gloves "give off a sense of strength." His third element is the girl wearing a construction site helmet. The helmet is masculine, while the Japanese school uniform that the girl wears is feminine. **Watsuki said that he created Shinya, the main character, "on the spot." Watsuki believed that he created Shinya to have too much honesty, and that Shinya's personality overlaps the personality of Himura Kenshin, the main character of Rurouni Kenshin; he said that he regretted the overlap "a little." Watsuki created Chiho, the other major character, to show the "shojo theme of the moment" where the boy's maturity becomes larger than the girl's maturity. Watsuki felt that the plan "didn't work out so well" and "a lot isn't what I wanted it to be." He added that he liked portraying the "helpful nature" of Chiho. *''Gun Blaze West'' is set in the United States in the 1800s, the three main characters look for the gunslinger's paradise "Gun Blaze West". It was canceled after three volumes. *''Buso Renkin'' (武装錬金''Busō Renkin'') ran for eighty chapters (10 volumes), of which seventy nine were published in Weekly Shōnen Jump, the final chapter was published in another magazine from Shueisha in two installments. *''Embalming -Dead Body and Bride-'' (エンバーミング Enbāmingu) is a one-shot written for "Jump the Revolution!" 2005. It takes its base from the Frankensteinian idea of bringing the dead to life. It is enclosed in the last volume of Buso Renkin. *''Embalming II -Dead Body and Lover-'' was written for "Jump the Revolution!" 2006 and is another one-shot that takes place in the Embalming universe *''Embalming -The Another Tale of Frankenstein-'' began publication in November 2007 in Jump Square. It is set in the realm of the other Embalming one-shots. *''Rurouni Kenshin: Restoration'' (Rurouni Kenshin Cinema-ban) is a ten chapter manga reboot written and drawn by Watsuki for the Jump SQ magazine as part of the promotion for the live action Rurouni Kenshin film. The story retells the manga's Tokyo arc up to the defeat of Kurogasa with events changed to coincide more closely with the events of the film. *''Controlling Flame -Rurouni Kenshin: Hidden Chapter-'' (Honō wo Suberu -Rurouni Kenshin: Uramaku-'') is a two-chapter spinoff manga penned by Watsuki in 2014 for ''Jump SQ. The manga depicts the events surrounding Shishio Makoto's first meeting with Komagata Yumi and their founding of the Juppongatana. Criminal Charges In November 2017, police found DVDs with footage of naked girls in their early teens in Watsuki's Tokyo office. The Tokyo Police then raided Watsuki's home as part of an investigation into the purchase of child pornography. The search uncovered DVDs containing videos of naked girls less than 18 years of age. Watsuki was referred to prosecutors over possession of child pornography on November 21, 2017.[23][24] The serialization of Rurouni Kenshin: The Hokkaidō Arc was put on hiatus after the details of Watsuki's charges were made public.[25][26] In February 2018, Watsuki was fined ¥200,000.[27] The Hokkaidō Arc resumed serialization in June of 2018.[28][29] Category:Real World